road trip – JimmyBramlett Dot Com

road trip

Road Trip Notes

jimmy

April 21, 2024

_{My Solar Eclipse road trip route, more or less.}

I really didn’t intend to marathon drive, but it was my only choice since I only had two days to make it from LA to Missouri. It wasn’t too bad, really. The fact that it is around 780 miles from here to Albuquerque, NM and another 830 miles to Springfield, MO does sound daunting. But I had rented a 2023 Infiniti Q50, had cruise control on for most of the way, had my tunes on. I never got sleepy or fatigued on this over 4,000-mile road trip. And since I really only ate once a day since I was sitting down most the day, there weren’t a lot of stops that needed to be made: just gas stops (where I also bought water), and pee breaks here and there.

This trip brought me to Missouri and Arkansas for the first time. This leaves Kansas, Nebraska and Iowa as the only states west of the Mississippi River I have yet to travel to.

Create your own visited states map or check out the JavaScript Charts.

Here are some thoughts I had while on this trip:

New Mexico has awful roads. I-10 was not too bad since there is only like 100 miles of it, but I-40 was fucking horrible. It’s one of the reasons I could not be sleepy since I had to dodge potholes. Although I did have a rental car, I still didn’t want to deal with the hassle of a flat tire in the middle of nowhere.
California drivers need to fucking realize that passing lanes are not travel lanes. That left lane is ONLY for passing.
Elderly drivers from Kansas and Missouri need to have their driver’s licenses revoked. Going slower than the speed limit is not safe driving you fucking cunts.
Camper vans, RVs and other large recreational vehicles need to be off the fucking road. They became problematic when tractor trailers needed to pass them and we were going up a hill.
I became even more sure of my atheism. Somewhere around San Antonio, I saw a pickup truck with a decal on its back window with a cross and Calvin from Calvin and Hobbes kneeling and praying towards the cross. Around it was written, “3 Nails + 1 Cross = 4 Given.” This boils down my problems with modern Christianity, that if you believe in Jesus you will go to heaven despite any actions you do on earth. It allows people to ease their consciences, to have no moral consequences for their actions. Sure they might have to suffer punishments for their actions, but because they believe in Jesus all guilt be gone! It has created such a moral bankruptcy and self-entitlement that’s pretty fucking sad.
I noticed this the most in the drivers of Texas. Their aggression is very intentional and verging on maniacal. I saw many cars cut over multiple lanes on the interstate to get to “their” spot in the fast lane that they felt is rightfully theirs. Mine mine mine. It was quite appalling and scary to be frank. But whatever. They’re going to heaven, so who cares?
While driving out of Texas I realized that since I was on the I-10, I would be passing through Tucson. In Tucson is the only location that Sweet Tomatoes (parent company of the beloved Souplantation) reopened. I was also fortunate that my timing landed me there about 30 minutes before it opened. It was everything I remembered it being: the salad bar, the soups, the breads, the soft serve and toppings. But what was odd was that in line waiting for it to open I saw four people who had amputated legs. I found that to be an abnormally high amount of amputees.
I was so happy to return to California. It sounds odd especially for people who live outside the state who sees us as freaks, but once I crossed the Colorado River I exhaled and felt relief. It’s not that I think we are normal, but more so that it’s the sort of abnormality that I’m used to. Like the stupid shit people in Texas do perplexes me, but I understand the reasons for the stupid shit we do here in California. It’s more of a comfort of familiarity rather than anything else.

It’s been a while since I did a long road trip like this, so it was nice to see the states again. Now to go to the final states I have left…

Blog 0 comments eclipse, road trip, solar eclipse

We’ve Been Mooned – 2024 Version

jimmy

April 14, 2024

After watching the total solar eclipse from Newport, Oregon back in 2017, I was determined to make it to this eclipse. If for no other reason depending on where I went I would get a four-minute eclipse rather than the one minute I got.

My initial plan was to go to the northern Dallas suburb of Allen, Texas to my aunt’s house and watch it with her. When I started checking the weather models a couple of weeks ago, things were starting to look cloudy. It then alternated between clear and cloudy leading right up to the last Saturday when I planned to leave. So I decided to take my Plan C option: to go to southeast Missouri to Poplar Bluff right near the bootheel.

I was going to sleep in Springfield, MO Sunday night and then make my way along US Route 60 east to Poplar Bluff to see the four minutes, nine seconds of totality. Since most of that route was going to be in the path of totality, I figured if I got stuck in traffic (which I counted on happening), I wouldn’t miss a thing.

It turned out the anticipated traffic jams didn’t happen. Sure there were what I assumed to be more traffic than normal, but we were going at least the speed limit through the hills of the Ozarks. I was shocked. I ended up in Poplar Bluff by 11am and had no idea where to go. I just figured I’d be stuck in traffic. So I found a park, drove out there and since all of the parking spaces were already taken I parked on the side of the road.

As you can see there were just a couple of wisps in the sky, but I was vindicated in my last minute plans. I was under the shade of a tree, there was a cool breeze blowing, and I knew once the eclipse started it would cool down around 10F. I only wished I had a better internet connection.

There was a family that were right behind me who thought I was taking really shitty pictures of the eclipse with my phone through my eclipse glasses, but I showed them which settings you needed to get something halfway decent:

Again to describe the darkness is difficult because it’s the sort of thing that only happens in an eclipse. Things dim, the shadows get weird, the birds shut up while the cicadas take over. But it’s not like a normal sunset, or storm clouds blocking the sun, or anything you know. In the final seconds before totality, I wanted to film what happened as the darkness really descended quickly, but I ended up filming totality by mistake.

Again tears came out. Even though this was my second time witnessing this, it didn’t diminish how amazing it was. While in Newport, OR in 2017 I only had a minute to bask, this time I had over four minutes. So I got my good camera with the f/300 lens and took this:

It wasn’t dark enough to see anything more than Jupiter and Venus in the sky, so I just spent the time alternately looking at the eclipse and looking at my surroundings. Then just like that, it ended far too soon.

While my first instinct was to run to my car (the black car in the lower right in the picture above) to beat traffic, there was one problem: while I thought the spot I parked on was grass, it was actually mud. A lot of mud. And I was stuck. Fortunately I called Enterprise right when I got there to schedule the tow truck. I worked with them to get to the park about an hour after the eclipse in hopes to let the cars leave. It took a little longer, but I managed to get out, go to a car wash to power wash the mud from the wheel wells and get to Texarkana, TX.

As great as it was to see this a second time, I think I will leave it at that. Unless I happen to be very close to the path of totality in the future, I won’t be chasing eclipses again. I don’t want them to lose their luster. So that’s it.

I ended up heading back towards Dallas and had lunch with my aunt and got back to LA on Friday. Yes. LA to SE Missouri and back in six days. Solo. I have other thoughts on this trip, but I’ll write about those later.